Elminster
Elminster’s parents, Prince Elthryn Aumar and Amrythale Goldsheaf, were married in 210 DR, and had a daughter, Narrune (named for Amrythale’s grandmother) in early 211 DR. When she was four months old, Narrune vanished from her cradle one night without her parents being awakened. When they did rise, come morn, they found much blood and her torn swaddlings, and the attic hay-hatch (through which rural folk forked hay to feed their horses and oxen through the worst deep-snow months) forced open. Unlikely though it was that any stealthy forest creature could slink past the village dogs, climb one of the taller cottages, and tear apart a stout wooden barred-from-within hatch, that’s what had obviously happened: Narrune had been devoured and lost. A wolf had been raiding the village that winter, and Elthryn tirelessly hunted it all the rest of the year, until he finally slew it as the snows came again. By then, Elthryn and Amrythale (in the way of hardy folk, in those perilous times) were done grieving. Their son Elminster was born in 212 DR, and his parents never spoke of Narrune to him, so for some centuries thereafter, El never knew he’d even had a sister -- until Mystra herself informed him that “one of her servants” (she never told him who, though El has suspected for some time that it was Azuth) had spirited Narrune away scant moments before a poisoner sent by Elthryn’s brother Othglas (the person who with needle-saws so quietly forced open the hay-hatch) entered the cottage. That servant’s spells snatched the poisoner halfway across the Kingdom of the Stag, into a swamp where he perished in the jaws of watery predators. Mystra originally intended to return Narrune “with portents and manifestations suitable to impress Elthryn that the goddess of magic desired him to obey her.” Her commandment to him would have been to withdraw from Athalantar and dwell elsewhere in hiding, until the coming strife-of-mages was over, so that the realm might endure as a place friendly to wizards, not turned against all workers-of-Art by the fell Magelords. However, she then reconsidered: holding a royal heir of Athalantar might prove useful in refounding the kingdom. So Narrune was never returned, but instead was magically disguised to closely resemble another infant girl, and substituted for that child. Darondblas (“DAIR-ond-blaz”) and Mareetha Sparcastle were a happy couple, and minor mages both. They dwelt in the rolling forests of what is today called the Border Kingdom, relieved to have escaped the politics of the Vilhon (where workers-of-Art were being impressed into the service of this or that petty ruler of the time, for use in covert ‘shadow wars’ of slayings, coercion, and oppression). A daughter, Unethe (“OO-nethh”) had been born to them, but had sickened of a fever. Unethe died the very night Narrune was stolen from Athalantar, and the one babe was substituted for the other without the exhausted Sparcastles being any the wiser. Narrune Sparcastle grew to adulthood ignorant of her true heritage. She lacked great beauty but also any touch of ugliness, and had a pleasant disposition. Like her mother, she became a good cook and seamstress, and in the fullness of time wed a local farmer, Oblyn Taetyn. From the view of sages or enthusiasts of warfare and adventure, their life together was uneventful. They had a son, Moeblur (“Mmm-OH-blurr”) Taetyn (named for Oblyn’s father), who in time inherited their farm. Like his parents, Elminster’s nephew had no aptitude for magic. What he did have was a restlessness. He travelled Faerun constantly as a caravan guard, peddler, or simply a vagabond wayfarer. When word came to him that his mother Narrune had died and the farm was now his, he returned to it only long enough to sell it, and set forth again. In time he came to Iriaebor, and hired on as a cellarer there (intending to stay only long enough to fill his belly and stay warm during the winter months) in a tavern. Whilst rummaging for long-forgotten bottles in an udnercellar, he found a loose stone behind which was an even deeper cellar. Being Moeblur, he had to explore it without delay—and so found a long-hidden Netherese tomb. And its traps found him. Caught in a spell that was either Phezult’s Sleep of Ages or a close equivalent that renders its victims invisible, he simply “vanished” as far as the tavernmaster (who hadn’t known where Moeblur had gone, and himself never went down into the “flooded several times over, so everything there must be ruined” undercellar) was concerned -- but in truth was frozen in stasis. There he remained for over a thousand years, trapped at age twenty-six while the Realms aged around him. Moeblur Taetyn was freed in 1337 DR when the spell failed (for reasons unknown -- at least to him, the only witness and a man entirely ignorant of matters magical), and found the world much changed. Bewildered, coinless, and hungry, he departed the city (where even a bed to sleep in costs something) and eked out an existence not far from its walls as a hunter and then a hired shepherd (for brigands preying on road-trade were then a problem, and persons willing to tend sheep, a ready food source, all too few). Favoured by Tymora all his life, Moeblur survived even the slings, arrows and cudgels of brigands, and in time married Araedya Welve, the daughter of his employer. They had a son, Rakrune, who joined his father in hunting and wandering. After Araedya died in a street accident (run down by a panicked cart-team of horses), father and son seldom returned to the city -- and the increasing grimmer Moeblur became reckless, challenging even wolves with nothing but a dagger and a snarl. Wounded many times and seemingly seeking death, he lasted only a handful of years before he died in Rakrune’s arms, torn apart by one too many challenged beasts. So Elminster’s great-nephew is a hardy man who calls himself “Rakrune of Iriaebor.” Rakrune is a tall, thin, ‘battered-handsome’ (he has the hawk-like Aumar nose, but also a large chin and fierce black eyebrows) adventurer who’s been making a very good living for some years now hunting down and capturing monsters (or harvesting their ‘parts’) for clients in Elturel and Scornubel. Rakrune is strong, quick, cunning, and fearless, but he has NO aptitude for magic, knows little history (and cares less), and isn’t all that shrewd in dealings with people. He doesn’t have to be: he’s a ranger who spends almost all of his time in the wilds, dealing with clients through several ‘go-between’ agents. Merry of disposition and kindly, Rakrune makes friends easily. He’s come to lead a band of young human and half-elven adventurers of both genders who know their chosen territory well, have established several caches and ‘hideholds,’ and are good at living rough off the land, even in winter. He doesn’t know he’s related to Elminster (whom he regards as a seldom-seen friend, after Elminster and some Harpers came unexpectedly to his aid against wolves some years back), and Elminster has no intention of telling him. So there you have it: Elminster’s great-nephew. A character who could easily star in his own novel or two. (Novels I’ll probably never have time to write, mind you, though of course it’s up to the good Books people at WotC if anyone else gets the chance to take up Rakrune’s saga. He could be VERY useful in a secret project that NDAs forbid me even hinting anything about.) Okay, let’s forget I mentioned two sigils for now, all right? Not because I want to keep secrets, but because transmitting a drawing of ‘the other one’ isn’t going to be easy for me right now, and because it’s a LONG story. I’ll tell it, some day - - just not now. So we’re left with the crescent moon, horns uppermost, and an oval floating in the ‘bowl’ created by those horns. This is the second sigil Elminster adopted (again, the why is very much part of that long story I referred to; the very short version is that he took this one because Mystra asked him to), he designed it himself, and he chose the crescent moon to echo the symbol of the Harpers (which he’d also designed, earlier) and because it also echoes the sigil of the Srinshee, his first teacher of magic in Myth Drannor, of whom he is very fond. The oval within the crescent symbolizes the ‘Great Watching Eye’ of Mystra, which was one of her favourite manifestations (a semi-tangible form in which she appeared to mortals: a giant floating eye that faded in and out of visibility/prime material plane “existence” and that could vary in apparent size from about nine feet across to about ninety feet across) at that time. (This is of course ‘the first’ Mystra, Elminster’s lover, not her replacement Midnight/Ariel Manx.) Elminster wanted a simple, easily-drawn sigil that pleased his eye, and that meant sweeping elven curves rather than any angular or ‘crossing strokes’ designs. Thanks to some work Azuth did with Mystra, all of the Chosen of Mystra can use their sigils in some ways that the sigils of ‘just plain wizards’ won’t function unless their ‘owners’ find or create special spells to imbue their sigils with such powers. Such mortals would have to cast one such spell to ‘empower’ each drawn sigil with a particular ability, whereas the Chosen can automatically use the functions I outline below on any drawing THEY HAVE PERSONALLY MADE of their own sigil, no matter where it is in Toril (or rather, Realmspace: in other words, these powers only function when the sigil is in contact with the Weave). These aren’t all of the uses of a sigil, they are merely those Mystra has revealed to her Chosen thus far. It should be noted that many of the Chosen strongly suspect that Mystra and Azuth can both use their sigils for much greater magical purposes (sending healing through them into the bodies of someone touching such a sigil, sending spells through these sigils into the minds of creatures touching them, either to affect the creature or for the creature to cast as if they had themselves memorized it, and so on). This would explain instances of devout worshippers or servants of Mystra or Azuth touching a sigil in personal emergencies and being healed, rendered invisible or gaseous, enabled to fly, teleported elsewhere, and so on. The deities (but not their Chosen) are also believed to be able to temporarily reshape sigils into writing, so as to send short (or slow, a few words at a time) messages. As any Chosen of Mystra can, Elminster can use his sigil as a spell focus in the following ways. Any of his sigils, no matter where the surface (page of a book, tile, or whatever) on which he drew it has been moved (even without his knowledge), are to be considered a known, familiar locale to him for the purposes of his casting clairaudience/clairvoyance ‘through’ the sigil (it becomes the magical sensor of the magic, regardless of distance from him at the time). Such a sigil is also considered a “very familiar” locale, regardless of where it may have been moved to, for the purposes of determining the success of a teleport or teleport object spell. In the same ‘regardless of distance’ manner, any of his sigils can function as the source (as if the sigil was the caster) for the spells: arcane eye, message, and silent image (remains stationary, anchored at sigil). The arcane eye can move about in the usual manner, or (more often used by Chosen) the sigil itself can function as the sensor. A sigil drawn directly over the arcane mark placed by another being doesn’t obliberate that mark, but causes it to completely cease functioning until the sigil is removed (this can have implications for the function of a Drawmij’s instant summons or other magics cast by the being who placed the arcane mark). At will, without casting a spell, a Chosen can cause any of his or her personally-drawn sigils to glow (akin in all respects to a faerie fire spell, with hue and intensity of light governed by the Chosen; the light can be made to pulse or wink in silent communication - - “Two means yes? One means no?”), and this function can work simultaenously with a spell (for example, clairaudience/clairvoyance used by the Chosen). The Chosen can instead cause a sigil to emit a continual flame (cancelling it by will at any time), but this power, though it can ignite things, apparently can’t be made to change colour or pulse. Category:Wizards